Pay for Chores? ……. No Way!

Sep 16

We pay other people to do things for us around the house, why not pay our children to do things around the house? Paying your child to do his chores sends the wrong message.

I’m a big believer in providing our children an allowance but I don’t believe we should connect an allowance to chores. Chores provide a parent with a great training opportunity; the opportunity to teach a child responsibility. Chores also say, “You belong to this family.”

No one pays the parent every time we empty the dish washer or fold the laundry. That’s because we’re a family member. Children should be doing chores because they live in your house; they eat and sleep on beds they didn’t buy and food they didn’t purchase.

Pay your child to do chores and the next time you ask them to help you clean the garage they’re natural response is, “How much? How much will you pay me to help you?”

If child doesn’t feel like doing the chore that day, they’ll skip the pay. To often parents assume this works as a consequence in the training. It doesn’t! The child only gave up something they didn’t feel they needed that day.

Paying a child to do chores doesn’t give them a training opportunity it gives you an employment opportunity (and the headaches that go along with having a payroll).